The city of San Diego is preparing to get rid of its only budgeted position that works with film productions. Film industry professionals say the decision is going to cost the region.
San Diego collected headlines last year when the Oscar-winning film “One Battle After Another,” filmed downtown and in Otay Mesa, brought in an estimated $6.8 million to the region.
“It shows Hollywood what San Diego can do,” Mayor Todd Gloria wrote in a Facebook post, touting the local crews, businesses and jobs the production supported.
But the filmmakers originally only planned to shoot downtown. The production then ran out of days to film outside of California while still receiving a tax incentive from the California Film Commission. Michael Glaser, the location manager for the film, told Times of San Diego that director Paul Thomas Anderson wanted to reshoot the film’s arresting opening scene, so together they looked to San Diego.
They sent some scouts to Otay Mesa and found what he referred to as the “chippy chippy chippy bridge” in the film. Securing the necessary permits required approval from various entities — Homeland Security, private land owners and Caltrans — all in less than two weeks. Glaser credits Guy Langman, the city of San Diego’s filming program manager, with getting it all done.
“I don’t think I’m being dramatic in saying this, but it just, it wouldn’t have happened,” Glaser said.
“It would have had to push weeks and weeks, which is not possible because we lose Leonardo DiCaprio to another movie,” he said. “Like, it just wouldn’t have happened.”
Glaser said there’s one major thing a public film office or dedicated commission can do that he can’t: fast track permit approvals with a city or county.
Langman’s job is currently the only dedicated position to working with and helping to bring film productions to the city of San Diego. Under Gloria’s proposed budget, that position will be eliminated.
Ramon Galindo, a city spokesperson, said San Diego would stop providing concierge services for location scouting, permit advisement and guidance, interjurisdictional support and student film mentorship. Those are all tasks currently handled by the city’s filming program manager.
Under the new structure, Parks and Recreation — a department itself facing significant personnel reductions in the proposed budget — will be responsible for issuing permits for filming. The city issued 439 such permits last year.
Galindo said last year the estimated economic impact of filming in the city was $10.6 million. A year earlier, filming contributed an estimated $17.4 million to the local economy.
If films, commercials and photo shoots that contribute to this economic activity can’t get permits on their fast-paced timeline, multiple location managers who spoke with Times of San Diego said they’d likely move to another city.
Lisa Rothmuller has been a location manager in San Diego for decades. She was the location manager for “Anchorman,” “Bring It On” and “Terriers,” among other projects. She watched the transition from the city’s film commission, which was eliminated in 2013, to it being replaced by the filming program manager position, housed under Parks and Recreation.
She said the collapse of the commission — along with the 2007 writers’ strike a few years earlier — set back San Diego production greatly. She now says she works mostly on commercials, but can build out a full-time work schedule through word of mouth.
Rothmuller said she relies on the city’s filming project manager for key assistance, such as advising her to avoid a house on a block that has previously complained about filming or giving her a direct line to the police department.
Rothmuller said losing the position would be another major blow to the industry.
“I would hate to see this whole entire community of filmmakers go under because we have a city that is so blind that it doesn’t understand that one position is kind of keeping this industry afloat,” she said.
Typically, a location manager like her or the city’s filming program manager is the first person a producer calls when deciding where they are going to set up their shoot.
“For me personally, I would say my biggest concern is that when a producer calls me and asks me if I can get a permit, they have a shoot in two weeks, can I get a permit? I won’t know if I can,” Rothmuller said.
“And if I’m not confident in knowing that I can make what they need happen, they will turn around and go to Florida,” she said.
That was recently the case for Welton Jones, a San Diego-based location manager.
The Oscar-nominated film, “If I Had Legs I’d Kick You,” was loosely inspired by a true story that took place in Del Mar, and he said the production was originally looking to film there. But Del Mar was not willing to “play ball” with the production — as Jones put it — so the filmmakers packed up to shoot on the east coast.
The city says that while it is eliminating the filming program manager, it is also supporting the county’s efforts to establish a regional film office to replace some of the tailor-made services the manager used to offer.
Greg Sowizdrzal, the president of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees Local 122, which supports the county’s initiative, said a regional film office would help San Diego remain competitive. He said the amount of work the city’s filming program manager has taken on has essentially given him the role that a regional commissioner would normally do. He said losing that person right now, would set back their efforts.
“We still need somebody working inside the city,” Sowizdrzal said. “We’re going to try to push the initiative at the county anyway, but without somebody at the city — that definitely hampers it.”
